Survivor (First to Fight #2)(57)

So when I come downstairs around four o’clock and find the ground floor empty and the kitchen devoid of two rambunctious teens, I frown. I glance at the clock over the table again to confirm the time and then my phone to see if there are any texts waiting from them. Finding my phone depressingly empty and silent, I tap out a text to Rafe to check in and then go to the kitchen to make a plate of their favorite microwaveable junk food. My mother would frown at the frozen pizza snacks, but I think she’d appreciate the sentiment nevertheless.

When the door opens and footsteps follow, my shoulders dip in relief. I look up and promptly drop the pizza snacks in a pile on the baking sheet.

“Oh, my favorite,” Jack says as he strides into the kitchen. “Save me some before the brats come in, okay?”

He pauses on his way through to kiss my cheek and I turn it up obediently, then he clips a leash to Rosie’s collar to walk her in the backyard. I watch them through the back window as I rinse off the dishes and put them in the dishwasher for a load later.

Even though I know his doctor and recruiting officer gave their stamp of approval on the completion of his physical therapy, I still dissect his gait for any sign of a limp. They’ve told me time and again he’s healed. I know there isn’t one, but I still think I see it sometimes if I’m looking out of the corner of my eye or if I’m watching him from far away. A figment of my fears realized, I’m sure, but it spawns the guilt souring my stomach just the same.

I turn away from his smiling face in the window to pull the food from the oven and place it on the counter to cool. Rosie announces their entrance with a series of high pitched yips and then careens through the kitchen and into the hallway. Jack follows close behind, hanging the leash on the hook by the backdoor. He snags a still hot pizza snack and tosses it in his mouth, hissing when the food burns his tongue.

“I don’t care what anyone says, this is the best food on Earth.” He chases the first with a swig of water and then downs a second.

“Have you seen the boys?” I ask as I wipe down the counters.

“Mmhmm,” he mumbles around another bite.

“Where are they? They’re supposed to be home by now.”

“Sent them to their friends’ house for the afternoon.”

I whirl around, clenching the towel in my hands. “You did?”

“Yep.”

“Why’d you do that?” I glance at the kitchen door and calculate how quickly I can make an exit, but I know it’s useless. Even recovering from an injury his speed is superhuman.

“So I could get you alone,” he says. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

I’d deny it, but I can’t even force the lie through my lips, so I bite them instead and keep washing the same spot on the counter until he pushes off the opposite side and comes to stand beside me.

“I’ve given you time. I thought maybe you were upset at me for not keeping you safe that day, but I don’t think that’s it.”

I can’t help it, I look up, my eyebrows drawn. “You don’t?”

He shakes his head, leaning an elbow and a hip against the counter. “No, I don’t.”

Ignoring the turn of the conversation, I skirt around him to go ahead and get started on a dinner I’ll likely burn, but he grabs ahold of my belt loop and spins me around until I’m facing him.

“Let me go, Jack,” I say in what I think of as a perfectly calm and reasonable tone. It’s the same one I’ve used on him every day since he got out of the hospital. The same one that convinced him to do his physical therapy and attend his doctor visits.

It was either stay calm and reasonable…or admit how close I was to almost losing him again.

“No,” he says, his voice mimicking mine.

I start to tug at my arm, but he is incredibly stronger than I am and he reels me into his chest despite my struggles. “I need to start dinner,” I say, growing a little more frantic now.

“I don’t think so,” he says.

“The boys will be home soon.” I nearly wince at the growing desperation that turns my voice reedy and thin.

“No, they won’t. They’re staying the night. Friend’s mom is going to bring them by tomorrow morning.”

I swallow against the growing lump in my throat. “Why would you do that?”

“Because you have nothing to be afraid of now.”

“I’m not afraid,” I say immediately.

He pulls me closer and I let him because I’m so damn tired I don’t have the strength to fight anymore. “You need to stop.”

“I’m not doing anything.”

“You’re blaming yourself,” he says. “It wasn’t your fault.”

“I know that.”

“I don’t think you do. I think you’re working yourself to death here for me and the boys because you think you have to for some reason. To make up for being gone or to apologize for that sonuvabitch playing slice and dice with my leg, but neither of those things deserve your blame or your penance because neither of them were your fault.”

“I’m not—”

“Stop,” he says. “Just stop, baby. I can’t watch you punish yourself like this anymore. So do whatever you have to, blame me, hurt me, use me, whatever. Just take it out on me so we can move on.” He presses his cheek to mine. “I want my best friend back.”